AACR Presents E-cigarette Webinar to Educate the Public

AACR supports FDA’s sales ban to youth

9/27/2016

​PHILADELPHIA — In recognition of the U.S Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) ban on e-cigarette sales to youth in effect this past month, the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Tobacco and Cancer Subcommittee has released a new webinar, “E-cigarettes: Research, Public Health Concerns and Opportunities, and Regulations,” featuring key experts that will present current research on and the public health impact of e-cigarettes.

The webinar includes presentations by the FDA; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC); Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Yale Cancer Center; Peter G. Shields, MD, Ohio State University; and Benjamin A. Toll, PhD, Medical University of South Carolina.

“This webinar is part of our ongoing educational and advocacy efforts regarding e-cigarettes to inform the public and the community on the health impact of their use,” said Herbst, chair of the AACR Tobacco and Cancer Subcommittee and chief of medical oncology at Yale Comprehensive Cancer Center. “With our goal of ending all tobacco use to prevent cancer and finding effective cessation tools for users, we applaud the FDA in exercising its authority to protect our youth through the enforcement of the youth sales restrictions and health warning labels.”

The release of the webinar aligns with the AACR’s continued support of the FDA’s pivotal decision in May of this year to “deem” additional tobacco products to be regulated by the agency under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act. One important provision of the FDA deeming rule is to ban the sale of all tobacco products in FDA’s jurisdiction to youth under the age of 18 years, including electronic (e-) cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco, and waterpipe tobacco. This ban on sales and distribution became effective on Aug. 8, 2016, 90 days after the release of the FDA deeming rule.

"The AACR is extremely concerned about the current statistics that show the rising use of e-cigarettes among young people, which may lead to a new generation who will become dependent on nicotine," said Margaret Foti, PhD, MD (hc), chief executive officer of the AACR. "Therefore, we applaud the FDA’s enforcement of its rule to regulate e-cigarettes and other tobacco products in the same way that it regulates traditional cigarettes and smokeless tobacco. The actions that the FDA is taking to ban tobacco products from being sold to anyone under 18 will improve public health and protect future generations from the dangers of tobacco use.”

Tobacco continues to be the leading cause of preventable death in the United States and is associated with 18 different types of cancers. The emergence of e-cigarettes and other electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS) has become a major public health concern, particularly within the youth population, as research on the public health impact of their use continues.